BETTER LATE THAN NEVER -- REVIEW OF JEREMY DENK AT OBERLIN COLLEGE

In celebration of the release of Jeremy Denk's new CD "Ligeti/Beethoven" we are posting Larry's never-before-published review of Jeremy's concert in Oberlin last January. As you will see below, Jeremy's concert that week contained much of the same repertory as his new CD (which, by the way if marvelous and you should run right out and get it). The concert was part of Oberlin Conservatory's inaugural Rubin Institute for Music Criticism. We both participated as "audience critics" that week. Every day, six audience critic reviews were selected for posting on the Rubin website and entered into prize consideration.  Two of Larry's review were selected. But this Denk review was not. Oddly enough, we thought it was the best of the lot. Go figure. Read and enjoy. 

Review: Jeremy Denk at Finney Chapel

(by Larry Dunn)

Oberlin, Ohio | January 19, 2012

Stomping feet rattled the balcony in Finney Chapel again last night for the triumphant return to Oberlin College of pianist and favorite son Jeremy Denk. Mr. Denk presented a program of works by three iconic keyboard music masters of their eras: two Bach Toccatas, Beethoven’s Eroica Variations and Piano Sonata No. 32, and Ligeti’s Etudes, Book 1. The concert was the second in a series presented as part of Oberlin’s inaugural Rubin Institute for Music Criticism. 

Music critic Charles Michener, in his Rubin Institute opening address, called music performance a set of overlapping, simultaneous conversations between performer and composer, within/among the performers themselves, between performers and the audience, and so on. This construct provides a perfect model for understanding Mr. Denk’s achievement on Thursday evening -- a swirling hurricane of conversations between and among Bach, Beethoven, Ligeti, Bill Evans, Mr. Denk, and the audience, with some Bernstein and Ives thrown in for good measure.  

Mr. Denk opened with Bach’s Toccatas BWV 912 and 910. Mr. Denk “discussed” with Herr Bach and the audience the prominence Bach’s artful counterpoint and fugal forms have in music still today. He pointedly displayed elements of these “touch pieces” that sound modern, even at this moment. 

Next, Mr. Denk added Herr Beethoven to the conversation with his 15 Variations and Fugue, Op. 35. He began the piece slyly, showing us Beethoven as a shapeshifter with a surprise for us -- his splendid Prometheus theme. Then he demonstrated, using Herr Bach’s tools, all the personalities this marvelous theme can embody through shifts in rhythm and mode, ending with a fugue Herr Bach would be proud to have written. 

Central to the conversational hurricane was the orderly disorder of Ligeti’s Etudes. Mr. Denk called them “unimaginable counterpoint . . . just beyond what is possible for the pianist to play.” But Mr. Denk was undeterred. He played Etude No. 1 like a fractured 16th variation of the Eroica theme, as if Herr Beethoven’s naughty pupil Gyorgy had shattered the theme, and no matter how he puzzled on piecing it back together, out came “Disorder.” Etude No. 5, with Mr. Evans joining the conversation, sounded like a deconstructed Peace Piece, Mr. Evans’ ruminative reverie on Bernstein’s Some Other Time. The final Etude No. 6 tumbled straight off the left end of the keyboard. 

Mr. Denk concluded his prepared conversation with Beethoven's Op. 111, the final statement in a 27-year exploration of the piano sonata form. Mr. Denk disclosed Herr Beethoven’s most profound “discussions” with Herr Bach in the dark and dramatic opening movement, followed by the introspective Arietta and variations, ending in stasis, and silence. 

The appreciative audience coaxed Mr. Denk into an encore discussion, his charming reading of “The Alcotts” movement from Ives’ “Concord” Piano Sonata. Herr Beethoven was there for all to hear in a sudden reference to the opening figure of his 5th Symphony. Mr. Denk also revealed Ives prefiguring “swing” passages Mr. Evans must have adored.